Gods of Egypt - directed by Alex Proyas
Starring: Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Brenton Thwaites, Courtney Eaton, Chadwick Boseman, Gerard Butler, Elodie Yung, Bryan Brown, Emma Booth, Rachael Blake, Felix Williamson, Geoffrey Rush, Abbey Lee
Screenplay: Matt Sazama & Burk Sharpless
Music Score by: Marco Beltrami
Cinematography: Peter Menzies Jr
Edited by: Richard Learoyd
Running Time: 127 minutes
Rated: M - Fantasy violence similar to The Mummy movies
Silly.
That was the word that kept popping into my head as I watched "Gods of Egypt" today.
This is a very, very silly movie.
It is set in an ancient Egypt that never existed, populated with beasts and heroes that bear only a passing resemblance to mythology.
And Gerard Butler is the bad guy.
Yep - it is super, mega silly.
But Ra help me if I didn't sort of enjoy it.
This movie would like to be a franchise starter like the first Mummy was (the 1999 Stephen Sommers one) but this seems unlikely.
You see it isn't very good.
I know- I have just finished stating that I sort of enjoyed it.
The 'sort' of condition was there because this movie is not very well written, not very well acted and some of the special effects are a tad ropey.
For me though this sort of movie isn't killed by those things necessarily so long as it isn't boring and "Gods of Egypt" is not.
Even at more than two hours I found enough to like that I wasn't looking at my watch or shifting in my seat.
It goes out of its way to present spectacle and mostly it succeeds.
The wide shots of ancient Egypt are stunning and there is an impressive opening zoom in that takes us from high above the city to right down to the street level where thief Bek (Brenton Thwaites) is stealing a piece of jewellery for his girlfriend.
In voiceover Bek tells us that a man would do anything for love and this will become the main idea in driving the plot.
In Bek's case his love is for Zaya played by the beautiful Australian actress Courtney Eaton.
Audiences will know her from "Mad Max: Fury Road" in which she played the wide eyed innocent Cheedo the Fragile.
The pair get separated when Horus (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) is attacked and his father Osiris (Bryan Brown) killed at a ceremony to transfer the throne from father to son.
The villainous Set (Gerard Butler) takes the crown, Horus' eyes(!) and girlfriend and commences an iron glove rule that makes slaves of mortals.
Zaya is put in the service of Urshu (Rufus Sewell) and as part of his plan to free her Bek steals back one of Horus' eyes.
As they flee Urshu puts an arrow through the young woman's heart.
Bek seeks out the exiled, blind Horus and returns the eye in exchange for Zaya's life.
As a God Horus can apparently bring the dead back to life.
Yep... it is silly.
What stopped the rampant silliness overcoming the whole movie for me was the casting.
And even while I am stating that I note that some - most really- of the performances are terrible
Everyone involved has done far, far better than this and in the case of Elodie Yung I certainly hope that this is a blip as she is about to appear on screen as Elektra in season two of Netflix's excellent Daredevil.
She looks amazing and in fairness to her the lines she is required to recite don't help but this is only slightly better than school play level quality.
Chadwick Boseman is even worse as a camp God named Thoth who is supposed to provide comic relief but his performance is so awful that any joke that could have been remotely funny gets lost in his overblown expressions and effete accent.
Boseman will soon be on screens as Black Panther in "Captain America: Civil War" and later in the standalone character movie.
I sincerely hope that he too is better than this movie would lead me to believe.
Brenton Thwaites ("Maleficent", "Oculus" and the upcoming "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales") fares better without actually being very good either.
And don't get me started on good old Jerry Butler as Set who thinks that since Sean Connery got away with playing a Russian Submarine Commander with a Scots accent then surely he can get away with playing an Egypt God with one......
No Gerard. No you can't. You are not Sean Connery.
Nikolaj Coster-Waldau is clearly the star of the film and while he too is not going to win any Oscars for acting in the film he makes it over the line on pure charisma.
With his chiseled jaw and carefully styled messy hair he is the Han Solo of the movie.
If the long gestating Metal Gear Solid movie ever gets made and Josh Holloway passes Coster-Waldau would be a fine choice as Snake.
I like this guy and I know that he can do better but he can play this stuff in his sleep and although it looks like he may have done exactly that the movie is better for his presence.
As Zaya Courtney Eaton is so adorable and so indescribably lovely that I can't be objective about her performance.
I was bordering on angry when Zaya's death took her out of the movie for extended periods but a slew of action set pieces helped take my mind off it.
And the action isn't too bad at all.
There is a very Sinbad / Clash of the Titans number of beasts and creatures for the heroes to take on.
Bek must navigate Indiana Jones-esque traps and mazes and Horus must deal with a couple of giant fire-breathing snakes ridden by God- babes (one played by Mad Max: Fury Road's Abbey Lee)
There is a pretty decent waterfall sequence with some muscular pig-like warriors and I quite liked the opening fight at the crowning.
The God Ra who floats in space on a giant ship must fight off a huge smokey slug thing every night to prevent it from destroying the planet too.
Geoffrey Rush as Ra gets the line of the movie in this scene.
As Horus lands on the deck of his ship Ra tells him "I normally kill birds that lan on my boat before they shit".
That this is my pick for the best line should tell you all that you need to know about the quality of the script.
And I mentioned that the whole thing is silly right?
"Gods of Egypt" is not going to convince anyone who thinks that Alex Proyas' "Crow" or "Dark City" were flukes that he is a good director but he did deliver a film that I found to be quite a lot of fun.
It is a big movie filled with some really rather nifty ideas.
It isn't short on imagination.
The issue is that it doesn't apply much logic in using its good ideas.
Set's ex-wife waits for him calmly as he kills his way to her tower seeking revenge.
(For what I don't know)
After a brief chat about the failed marriage she sprouts wings with the intention of flying out of the window to safety.
Set easily grabs the starboard flapper and pops her right back in to chop both wings off.
Why did she even wait?
The giant snake sequence is fun but too suffers from logic issues.
And so it goes - baffling lapses that stop this movie from being anything more than an interesting (and fun) failure.
Maybe it was because I wasn't expecting much from this movie and it delivered exactly what I was in the mood for under conditions of low expectation that I liked it as much as I did.
IMAX and 3D helped but the bigger screen both helps and hinders depending on the quality of the image on screen and this is a mixed bag.
In all good conscience I cannot score it as highly as my enjoyment would suggest because there is so much wrong with pretty much every aspect of the filmmaking.
So I am going to say 68 /100 and ask that you apply a secret handicap of 5 points if you don't mind bad but fun flicks.
And let me reiterate.... a couple of hot models ride giant fire-breathing snakes!
RATING: 68/ 100
CONCLUSION: Yes, it is silly beyond words and the acting and script are dodgy more often than not. But I had fun and both Courtney Eaton and ancient Egypt are treats for the eyes.
Screenplay: Matt Sazama & Burk Sharpless
Music Score by: Marco Beltrami
Cinematography: Peter Menzies Jr
Edited by: Richard Learoyd
Running Time: 127 minutes
Rated: M - Fantasy violence similar to The Mummy movies
Silly.
That was the word that kept popping into my head as I watched "Gods of Egypt" today.
This is a very, very silly movie.
It is set in an ancient Egypt that never existed, populated with beasts and heroes that bear only a passing resemblance to mythology.
And Gerard Butler is the bad guy.
Yep - it is super, mega silly.
But Ra help me if I didn't sort of enjoy it.
This movie would like to be a franchise starter like the first Mummy was (the 1999 Stephen Sommers one) but this seems unlikely.
You see it isn't very good.
I know- I have just finished stating that I sort of enjoyed it.
The 'sort' of condition was there because this movie is not very well written, not very well acted and some of the special effects are a tad ropey.
 |
| Nikolaj Coster-Walder and Brenton Thwaites |
Even at more than two hours I found enough to like that I wasn't looking at my watch or shifting in my seat.
It goes out of its way to present spectacle and mostly it succeeds.
The wide shots of ancient Egypt are stunning and there is an impressive opening zoom in that takes us from high above the city to right down to the street level where thief Bek (Brenton Thwaites) is stealing a piece of jewellery for his girlfriend.
In voiceover Bek tells us that a man would do anything for love and this will become the main idea in driving the plot.
In Bek's case his love is for Zaya played by the beautiful Australian actress Courtney Eaton.
Audiences will know her from "Mad Max: Fury Road" in which she played the wide eyed innocent Cheedo the Fragile.
The pair get separated when Horus (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) is attacked and his father Osiris (Bryan Brown) killed at a ceremony to transfer the throne from father to son.
The villainous Set (Gerard Butler) takes the crown, Horus' eyes(!) and girlfriend and commences an iron glove rule that makes slaves of mortals.
Zaya is put in the service of Urshu (Rufus Sewell) and as part of his plan to free her Bek steals back one of Horus' eyes.
As they flee Urshu puts an arrow through the young woman's heart.
Bek seeks out the exiled, blind Horus and returns the eye in exchange for Zaya's life.
As a God Horus can apparently bring the dead back to life.
Yep... it is silly.
What stopped the rampant silliness overcoming the whole movie for me was the casting.
And even while I am stating that I note that some - most really- of the performances are terrible
Everyone involved has done far, far better than this and in the case of Elodie Yung I certainly hope that this is a blip as she is about to appear on screen as Elektra in season two of Netflix's excellent Daredevil.
She looks amazing and in fairness to her the lines she is required to recite don't help but this is only slightly better than school play level quality.
 |
| Elodie Yung and friend |
Boseman will soon be on screens as Black Panther in "Captain America: Civil War" and later in the standalone character movie.
I sincerely hope that he too is better than this movie would lead me to believe.
Brenton Thwaites ("Maleficent", "Oculus" and the upcoming "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales") fares better without actually being very good either.
And don't get me started on good old Jerry Butler as Set who thinks that since Sean Connery got away with playing a Russian Submarine Commander with a Scots accent then surely he can get away with playing an Egypt God with one......
No Gerard. No you can't. You are not Sean Connery.
Nikolaj Coster-Waldau is clearly the star of the film and while he too is not going to win any Oscars for acting in the film he makes it over the line on pure charisma.
With his chiseled jaw and carefully styled messy hair he is the Han Solo of the movie.
If the long gestating Metal Gear Solid movie ever gets made and Josh Holloway passes Coster-Waldau would be a fine choice as Snake.
I like this guy and I know that he can do better but he can play this stuff in his sleep and although it looks like he may have done exactly that the movie is better for his presence.
As Zaya Courtney Eaton is so adorable and so indescribably lovely that I can't be objective about her performance.
I was bordering on angry when Zaya's death took her out of the movie for extended periods but a slew of action set pieces helped take my mind off it.
And the action isn't too bad at all.
There is a very Sinbad / Clash of the Titans number of beasts and creatures for the heroes to take on.
Bek must navigate Indiana Jones-esque traps and mazes and Horus must deal with a couple of giant fire-breathing snakes ridden by God- babes (one played by Mad Max: Fury Road's Abbey Lee)
There is a pretty decent waterfall sequence with some muscular pig-like warriors and I quite liked the opening fight at the crowning.
The God Ra who floats in space on a giant ship must fight off a huge smokey slug thing every night to prevent it from destroying the planet too.
Geoffrey Rush as Ra gets the line of the movie in this scene.
As Horus lands on the deck of his ship Ra tells him "I normally kill birds that lan on my boat before they shit".
That this is my pick for the best line should tell you all that you need to know about the quality of the script.
And I mentioned that the whole thing is silly right?
 |
| Courtney Eaton as Zaya - Bunbury's finest export |
It is a big movie filled with some really rather nifty ideas.
It isn't short on imagination.
The issue is that it doesn't apply much logic in using its good ideas.
Set's ex-wife waits for him calmly as he kills his way to her tower seeking revenge.
(For what I don't know)
After a brief chat about the failed marriage she sprouts wings with the intention of flying out of the window to safety.
Set easily grabs the starboard flapper and pops her right back in to chop both wings off.
Why did she even wait?
The giant snake sequence is fun but too suffers from logic issues.
And so it goes - baffling lapses that stop this movie from being anything more than an interesting (and fun) failure.
Maybe it was because I wasn't expecting much from this movie and it delivered exactly what I was in the mood for under conditions of low expectation that I liked it as much as I did.
IMAX and 3D helped but the bigger screen both helps and hinders depending on the quality of the image on screen and this is a mixed bag.
In all good conscience I cannot score it as highly as my enjoyment would suggest because there is so much wrong with pretty much every aspect of the filmmaking.
So I am going to say 68 /100 and ask that you apply a secret handicap of 5 points if you don't mind bad but fun flicks.
And let me reiterate.... a couple of hot models ride giant fire-breathing snakes!
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